Thursday, February 15, 2007

Parshas Yisro



This is in the merit of my grandmother, Esther bat Mazal. May she have speedy and complete recovery.



Question:



According to the Rambam, the Ten Commandments (referred to by the Torah as the Ten Statements in Deuteronomy 4:13) actually contain 14 commandments. Why then call them ten?





A Servant of Others





"The next day, Moses sat to judge the people. They stood around Moses from morning to evening" (Exodus 18:13).



At this point in time, whenever anybody had a question, they went to Moses and he spent the entire day answering questions. Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, thought this would wear Moses out so he advised Moses to set up a court system:



"'But you must [also] seek out from among all the people capable, God-fearing men - men of truth, who hate injustice. You must then appoint them over [the people] as leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, and leaders of tens. Let them administer justice for the people on a regular basis. Of course, they will have to bring every major case to you, but they can judge the minor cases by themselves. They will then share the burden, making things easier for you'" (Exodus 18:21-22).



Moses listened to Jethro's advise:



"He chose capable men from all Israel, and he appointed them as administrators over the people, leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, and leaders of tens. They administered justice on a regular basis, bringing the difficult cases to Moses, and judging the simple cases by themselves" (Exodus 18:25-26).



There is one difference I would like to point out:



Jethro's advice:

they will have to bring every major case to you, but they can judge the minor cases by themselves



Moses' fulfillment of the advice:

bringing the difficult cases to Moses, and judging the simple cases by themselves





What is the significance of this change?



I don't remember where I heard this but the answer is that a leader is a servant of the people, both the community and also every individual, and thus a leader wants to help his or her people. Thus, no question is too trivial.



Moses changed the system because he would wear out, not because he didn't want to serve the Jewish people.



In his later years, when one would ask Reb Yaakov Kamenetsky (who lived for 90 years), why he merited such a long life, he answered, "My feeling is that Hashem has granted me these extra years as a gift to use for others" (259). He never had a shammos, a secretary, of any kind deciding who would get to speak to him and who would not, either he or his wife would answer the phone (279). Additionally, he wouldn't let the phone be taken off the hook, not even during naps, out of fear that somebody needed to speak with him (259) and Reb Yaakov couldn't talk to a caller, he would still personally explain to the caller that he was involved in something else (251). Although eventually Reb Yaakov and his wife needed somebody to answer the phone for them, it was not to prevent people from speaking with them (279).



All citations are from the Artscroll biography of Reb Yaakov Kamenetsky.





Food for Further Thought and Discussion



How do we balance devoting ourselves to our families and to others? Obviously, we must help others and our family and friends must come first. But what is the balance?



Have a good Shabbas,
Mordechai

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